Background: Roses are popular ornamental plants and are used in the fresh cut flower and perfume industries. However, one of the major challenges for roses is maintaining their long post-harvest shelf life. Aim: Therefore, in the present study, the effect of nanographene oxide and silver nanoparticles with and without plasma water on the post-harvest shelf life of cut rose flowers of Angel cultivar is investigated.
Methodology: Cut rose flowers of Angel cultivar were harvested at the natural maturity stage (when the sepals start to bend downwards). A total of 72 flower branches were divided into 24 treatments, 8 treatments each with 3 replicates and each replicate had 3 flower branches. Treatments included: 1- DW (distilled water), 2- DW+SNP (distilled water with silver nanoparticles), 3- DW+GO (distilled water with graphene oxide), 4- DW + SNP + GO (distilled water with silver nanoparticles and nanographene oxide), 5- PW (water plasma), 6- PW+ SNP (water plasma with silver nanoparticles), 7- PW+ GO (water plasma with nanographene oxide), 8- PW+ SNP+ GO (water plasma with silver nanoparticles and nanographene oxide). The harvested flowers were examined for their physical characteristics such as vase life, relative dry and fresh weight, dry matter percentage, flower diameter, branch diameter, solution absorption rate, superoxide dismutase enzyme, catalase enzyme, glutathione peroxidase enzyme, stem bacteria count, as well as the number of vase soluble bacteria, chlorophyll a, b and total chlorophyll, and chlorophyll carotenoid index. Data were analyzed by analysis of variance and comparison of means using SPSS statistical software.
Conclusions: The study on the effects of different treatments on the quality and characteristics of cut flowers of the Angel rose cultivar revealed that the treatment of “plasma water + silver nanoparticles + graphene oxide” exhibited superior performance across all evaluated indices. This combination led to increased fresh weight (143.3 g